Yes, you read that right! (I’m going to try very hard to avoid any distasteful punnery here!)

Birmingham City Council launched bra recycling bins last month, and they have already been stuffed with over a thousand unwanted bras. The innovative bra recycling scheme raises funds for Breast Friends, a Sutton Coldfield based group offering support to women with breast cancer. The bras are sold to traders in developing countries via a local recycling company, meaning women in these countries gain access to garments they might not normally be able to afford.

BCC are asking the women of Birmingham for a marathon effort in collecting and recycling even more bras. Literally. They want to try and collect enough bras to stretch the length of an olympic marathon, 26 miles and 385 yards, before the start of the games in London in 2012. This would mean a donation of 46,145 unwanted bras in the next 22 months!

So if you have any such garments that you no longer need, you can take them to the Bra Bank at Sainsburys on Frankley Beeches Road in Northfield.

Strategic Director for Environment and Culture at Birmingham City Council, Sharon Lea, said “I urge everyone to take up our challenge and enable Birmingham to go for gold with our marathon challenge between now and 2012.”